My
Problem with J Street: Obama And The American Jewish Power
14 November 2009
By Philip
Giraldi
As readers of
Antiwar.com certainly are aware, J Street was created
a year and a half ago to serve as an alternative to
the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC).
J Street supports creation of a viable Palestinian
state that would exist side-by-side in peace with
Israel. Unlike AIPAC, J Street advocates first
negotiating issues rather than dropping bombs and it
rejects the view that American Jews should close ranks
and reflexively and unconditionally support every
government in Israel. J Street targets liberal minded
American Jews who are troubled by the Israel Lobby's
right wing-Likud orientation. It promotes itself as
pro-Israel, pro-American, and pro-peace, maintaining
that it is possible to support Israel without having
to endorse all Israeli government actions. It has
recently concluded its first Washington conference
which attracted a smattering of politicians. General
James Jones, President Barack Obama's National
Security Adviser, was a featured speaker.
J Street has come under attack from the usual
suspects, to include the Weekly Standard, the National
Review, and assorted individual neocons. Because of
the attacks, there has been a "my enemy's enemy"
response and a number of opponents of AIPAC and the
neocons have rallied to J Street, in some cases purely
because the neocon onslaught suggests that J Street
must be a good thing. Some defenders of J Street have
pointed out that it is more moderate than AIPAC and
therefore must be considered a better lobbying option
even if it sometimes has to embrace compromise
policies that are imperfect. Others have argued that
even when it has to take certain positions tactically
it still represents the best hope for a peaceful
future in the Middle East.
I have to disagree. I believe that J Street is just
another Israel advocacy group with a slightly more
progressive and politically correct and therefore
acceptable message. J Street wants carte blanche
United States support for Israel and, indeed, it might
reasonably be described as little more than a spin-off
of the existing Israel Lobby to make it more palatable
to the liberal Democrats that make up the Obama
Administration. It is one more voice pushing the same
old agenda with slightly different window dressing.
This is not to suggest that AIPAC and J Street are
actually acting in collusion but the two pro-Israel
lobbies clearly have the same overriding objective: to
preserve unlimited American support for the state of
Israel, not advancing the interests of the United
States except insofar as one assumes erroneously that
Tel Aviv's and Washington's interests are identical. J
Street calls continued massive US military aid to
Israel "an absolutely essential aspect of Israel's
security." If it is difficult to perceive any
pro-American element to the J Street program it is
because it is not about the United States at all – it
is about Israel. J Street believes Washington should
continue indefinitely in its role as Israel's patron,
security guarantor, and financial supporter.
On many of the specific issues, J Street is AIPAC lite.
It accepts an Israeli state based on religion, not on
equal rights for all citizens, specifically supporting
the apartheid-like right of any Jew to "return"
without affording similar rights to Christians or
Muslims who resided in Palestine before 1948. Its
Executive Director Jeremy Ben-Ami calls a one-state
solution to Israel/Palestine with all citizens having
the same rights a "nightmare."
In a recent interview he praised AIPAC and outlined
his vision for a continuing American-Israeli special
relationship saying, "for instance, the special
relationship between the U.S. and Israel, the
essential security guarantee that the U.S. provides,
the notion that Israel should always have a
qualitative military edge — those are things that have
been achieved by lobbying, by what some people would
call the `Israel lobby.' J Street is very happy with
these achievements, and we support those ends, and we
respect and admire much of what groups like AIPAC and
others have done over the years."
Ben-Ami also commented on the Mearsheimer- Walt book
on the Israel Lobby, saying "I don't like what Stephen
Walt and John Mearsheimer have written in their book
and in their articles. I don't agree with Stephen
Walt." He criticizes their scholarship and labels them
as anti-Semites, claiming that the book "essentially
says that all of American foreign policy is controlled
by this one lobby and this one interest group, to me,
personally, this does smack of the kind of conspiracy
theories contained in the Protocols of the Elders of
Zion."
Ben-Ami has also recently released a statement on Iran
in an apparent attempt to confirm to skeptical would
be supporters that J Street is willing to get tough
with the Mullahs.
"J Street supports the thoughtful and nuanced approach
to Iran sanctions legislation articulated yesterday by
Chairman Howard Berman. We agree that it is a vital
interest of the United States, Israel and the entire
Middle East to ensure that Iran does not obtain
nuclear weapons. Further, we agree with the Chairman's
stated policy preferences for achieving that
objective. J Street's first choice — as it is for
President Obama and Chairman Berman — is to resolve
the nuclear issue through diplomatic means. We, too,
strongly support the Obama Administration' s efforts
to engage Iran and hope for promising follow-through
to the first round of talks held in Geneva on October
1. However, should engagement not produce the desired
results, we too believe that the United States should
seek hard-hitting multilateral sanctions through the
United Nations Security Council. If that course of
action proves impossible, then the U.S. should work to
build the broadest possible international coalition to
back such steps. The imposition of unilateral
sanctions, without UN approval or the support of
allies, should be, as the Chairman himself says, a
last resort. J Street supports the Chairman's
intention to mark up the bill on October 28th and to
give the President further time to pursue our
preferred options. As we have said before, J Street
does not oppose the imposition of sanctions per se. We
prefer, as do Chairman Berman and President Obama,
attempting to achieve the desired result through
diplomatic engagement and multilateral action."
Describing Congressman Howard Berman as "thoughtful
and nuanced" regarding Iran is, to say the least,
generous and many have noted that his House bill is
basically an act of war requiring intervention by the
US Navy and would devastate the Iranian economy. His
bill has 327 co-sponsors and was marked up yesterday
in committee so that it can move to a vote in the full
house. Supporting "hard-hitting multilateral
sanctions" will only end any hopes for a negotiated
solution and will strengthen Iranian hardliners, as J
Street well knows. There is in fact little practical
difference between J Street's position and that of
AIPAC. J Street even supports denying Iran the right
to enrich uranium for peaceful purposes, which is
basically the Israeli government position, not that of
the US.
Ben-Ami does not accept the UN's Goldstone report that
detailed the Israeli war crimes committed in Gaza in
January, saying he is against embracing "the Goldstone
report and for standing up for the right of Israel to
defend itself or for its military aid." He publicly
praised President Obama for rejecting the report's
carefully arrived-at conclusions. J Street's nuanced
criticism of the brutal Israeli invasion of Gaza also
deserves to be quoted in full because it ignores the
murder of 300 Palestinian children by the Israeli
Defense Forces and only differs from AIPAC's position
in tone:
"Throughout the recent Gaza crisis, J Street
consistently called for strong American and
international leadership to reach a cease-fire that
ended all military operations, stopped the rockets
aimed at Israel, instituted an effective mechanism to
prevent weapons smuggling into Gaza to re-arm Hamas,
and lifted the blockade of Gaza. While the military
response by the Israeli Defense Forces may be
understood and even justified in the wake of Hamas
rocket attacks, we believe that a military response
that is disproportionate and escalatory will
ultimately prove counterproductive, igniting further
anger in the region and damaging long-term prospects
for peace and stability for Israel, the Palestinians,
and the whole region. Obviously Israel has the right
to employ military force to defend its citizens and
interests. The right question to ask, however, is not
whether Israel has that right, but whether the
specific actions taken by Israel in Gaza actually
serve Israel's legitimate long-term security interests
and America's best interests. In this case, J Street
believes they may well not."
There are other examples of allegedly moderate J
Street positions actually veering sharply to the
right. A J Street sponsored event in mid September
featured retired Israeli Major General Danny
Rothschild. The general was being introduced around
Washington where he openly advocated a two-state
solution with the Palestinians because of his belief
that it is the best solution for Israel. But he also
reiterated standard Israeli talking points about "Islamofascism"
and Iran, i.e. that there is no use talking to those
people and that Iran intends to develop a nuclear
weapon and has repeatedly threatened to destroy
Israel. He claimed, wrongly, that Tehran is rapidly
building up its armed forces and advocated a military
solution to the Iran problem. One attendee commented
afterwards that Rothschild sounded like an Israeli
version of Republican Senator John McCain.
J Street might well be sincere in its efforts and if
they help bring about something equating to a peace
settlement in the Middle East, I wish them success.
But it appears to me that J Street's positions are
just a variation on the usual Israel-first policies
that have been dominant in Washington for so long.
Since its founding, J Street has been drifting closer
to the Israeli government positions that it once
seemed to criticize and, since I am naturally cynical,
I might wonder if that was the intention right from
the beginning. One might well question in any event
why there should exist a lobby operating in Washington
consisting of American citizens promoting the
interests of a foreign country — but we live in
strange times. The founding fathers might have
considered such a schizophrenic world view
inappropriate for ostensibly loyal American citizens,
a view that I share.
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